On this holiday that celebrates George Washington and all who have followed him, test your knowledge of the U.S. presidency.
Click on a question below to reveal the answer.
How many presidents have there been?
Barack Obama is our 44th president, but there actually have been only 43 presidents: Grover Cleveland, right, was elected for two nonconsecutive terms and is counted twice, as our 22nd and 24th president.
Which college boasts the most presidents as alumni?
Harvard, with seven: J. Adams, J. Q. Adams, T. Roosevelt, F. Roosevelt, Kennedy, G.W. Bush (business school) and Barack Obama (law school). Yale is second, with five presidents as alumni: Taft, Ford (law school), G.H.W. Bush, Clinton (law school) and G.W. Bush.
Who were the oldest and youngest men to be elected president?
The oldest elected president was Reagan (age 69), above left; the youngest was Kennedy (age 43), above right. Theodore Roosevelt, however, was the youngest man to become president — he was 42 when he succeeded McKinley, who had been assassinated.
The president who lived the longest was Gerald Ford, who was born on July 14, 1913, and died Dec. 26, 2006, at age 93. Ronald Reagan also lived to be 93 years old.
Who were the tallest and shortest presidents?
The tallest president was Lincoln at 6-foot-4; at 5-foot-4, Madison was the shortest.
Name the eight left-handed presidents.
James A. Garfield, Herbert Hoover, Harry S. Truman, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
How many presidents served as vice president? How many never served in Congress?
Fourteen served as vice president: J. Adams, Jefferson, Van Buren, Tyler, Fillmore, A. Johnson, Arthur, T. Roosevelt, Coolidge, Truman, Nixon, L. Johnson, Ford and George H.W. Bush.
Eighteen never served in Congress: Washington, J. Adams, Jefferson, Taylor, Grant, Arthur, Cleveland, T. Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson, Coolidge, Hoover, F. Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Carter, Reagan, Clinton and G. W. Bush.
How many candidates won the popular vote but lost the presidency?
Four: Andrew Jackson won the popular vote but lost the election to John Quincy Adams (1824); Samuel J. Tilden won the popular vote but lost the election to Rutherford B. Hayes (1876); Grover Cleveland won the popular vote but lost the election to Benjamin Harrison (1888); Al Gore won the popular vote but lost the election to George W. Bush (2000).
Who was the only president never to marry? The only divorced president?
James Buchanan, above, was the only president never to marry. Five presidents remarried after the death of their first wives — two, Tyler and Wilson, remarried while in the White House. Reagan was the only divorced president.
Which president had the most children? How many had no children?
Tyler, right, — father of 15 — had the most. Six presidents had no children.
Name the presidents assassinated in office. How many others were the target of assassination attempts?
Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley and Kennedy were assassinated in office.
Assassination attempts were made on the lives of Jackson, T. Roosevelt, F. Roosevelt, Truman, Ford and Reagan.
How many presidents died in office?
Eight: W. Harrison (after having served only one month); Taylor; Lincoln; Garfield; McKinley, right; Harding; F. Roosevelt; and Kennedy.
Presidents Adams, Jefferson and Monroe all died on the same day of the year; Coolidge was born on that day. What day was it?
Fourth of July
Name the presidents buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
Kennedy and Taft.
Name the presidents portrayed on U.S. coins and then name those on U.S. paper currency.
Six on coins: Lincoln, Jefferson, F. Roosevelt, Washington, Kennedy and Eisenhower.
Nine on paper currency: Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Jackson, Grant, McKinley, Cleveland, Madison and Wilson.
What does Presidents Day commemorate?
The third Monday in February is designated in the United States as Washington's birthday, but it is commonly known as Presidents Day. There have been unsuccessful attempts in Congress to officially rename it Presidents Day. Many states, however, choose to call their own celebration on this day “Presidents Day.”
What was George Washington's occupation before he began his military career?
Surveyor.
About that cherry tree story ... is there any truth to it?
Nope. Washington's biographer, Mason Weems, wrote a book called “The Life of Washington” shortly after the death of our nation's first president and created the myth as a way to show Washington's honesty.
Who handled the budgeting during Washington's presidency?
Washington did his own bookkeeping and recorded every penny of expense or profit. His ledgers still exist. While he had only the equivalent of a grade-school education, he was gifted in mathematics.
How many states were added to the original 13 while Washington was president?
Five states were added to the Union during his presidency: North Carolina (1789), Rhode Island (1790), Vermont (1791), Kentucky (1792) and Tennessee (1796).
What was Washington's political party?
He had none. Washington tried to prevent the emergence of political parties, viewing them as factions harmful to the public good. But during his first term, the ideological division between Jefferson, above left, and Hamilton, above right, deepened, forming the outlines of the nation's first party system. This system was composed of Federalists, who supported expansive federal power and Alexander Hamilton, and the Democratic-Republicans, followers of Thomas Jefferson's philosophy of states' rights and limited federal power. Washington generally backed Hamilton on key issues, such as the funding of the national debt, the assumption of state debts and the establishment of a national bank.
Sources: Miller Center at the University of Virginia, infoplease.com, about.com American History; apples4theteacher.com
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